The Difference Between Complex and Complicated

Take a look at these two pictures below. Which is complex and which is complicated?

Or maybe you're asking, "Don't complex and complicated mean the same thing?"

Ah ha. Not neccessarily. They're not always the same thing. And it's a very interesting subtlety that defines the difference. 

A complicated system has many connected and related parts and importantly, it is difficult to understand. 

A complex system however also has many interacting parts but it has simple individual rules that deliver versatile emergent properties. 

In the example of a flock of birds, two simple rules might control the overall system; alignment of flight direction in comparison to the nearest bird and distance between neighbouring birds. These two variables are all that's needed to understand and change the system.

Complicated systems have many more variables.

One of my favourite sayings is "complicated problems do not need complicated solutions".

If you can identify the simple drivers that control emergent behaviour, you can focus on these simple changes. Complicated can be transformed to complex.

The more complicated you make a machine they more likely it will fail.

The same with business processes. 

Complicated problems are best solved with simple solutions. 

Measure Early and Measure Deep - Extend Your Conversion Funnels

It's a couple of month's old but today I came across an interesting infographic from Infectious Media which highlights the importance of "viewability" of an online advertisement.  

The headline: 54% of all digital advertising is not seen.

The key message is that optimising the placement of your ads will deliver a better result.  Much like focusing on the deliverability of emails will help optimise an email campaign.

In a conversion funnel, you need to address all of the main points.

1. How many people arrive at the entry point (search, navigation, subscriber list)
2.  How many people see the message (deliverability, viewability)
3. How many people click on the call to action (click through rate)

Except it's not that simple.  Ultimately what matters is if a customer pays.or transacts.  Either in this web session or a future one.  Either online, on the phone or in store.

A conversion funnel is not complete until the transaction of money in can be traced back to the spend of money to acquire the customer.

This is never easy to do because the customer may have seen many different messages along the way and might be transacting on the 3rd or 4th visit.  This is where attribution modelling comes in, a geeky sport in it's own right.

What you can focus on with some simplicity is putting tracking in as early and as deep into the funnel as you can.

Early: viewability is a good example

Deep:  Instead of measuring clicks from the ad, measure purchases as well.  Or sign ups.  Or downloads.  If you are taking the user offline to a phone call, measure phone calls.  Even better, measure phone calls answered.  Even better, measure phone calls answered where the call time is more than a time threshold. If you want to know how to do that, let me know.

Your conversion funnel is more accurate the earlier and deeper you measure.

The Telephone - It's Still Good To Talk

British Telecom (BT) famously told us, "it's good to talk".

There are some things that are just better if done over the phone. 

Transactions and information transmission suit online and text, synchronous conversations work well on the phone or face to face.  Asynchronous conversations suit chat or text.

So far this year, I found the phone (voice) to be my channel of choice when; enquiring about holiday options, discussing sensitive work topics, ordering a taxi, speaking with my family arranging for a decorator to work on our house.

There are many high value transactions that are initiated over the phone.  High value, offline leads.  Buying a car, buying a house, booking a holiday, finding a tradesman, purchasing financial products.  Conversations convert.

Apart from talking, my phone has been my preferred device for the following activities; emailing friends, reading updates from family on their travels (Facebook / Blog), ordering groceries, renting DVDs, making bank payments, checking the weather, reading the news, tuning my guitar, finding out how to get somewhere, selling second hand goods, buying movie tickets, reading a book on the train, following content of interest (Twitter, Quora), taking photos, checking train schedules and using a calculator.

I may be stating the obvious but we are all becoming heavier and heavier users of phones.  We all have them, 62% of UK mobile phones are now "smartphones" and we generally have them with us 24/7.  17.4% of global web traffic comes through mobile devices.  49% of UK adults access the Internet on their mobile and the average household now owns more than three types of Internet enabled device, with one in five owning six or more.

Call volumes have been declining slightly but there are still over 233 billion minutes a year made (2012 data: OFCOM).

If my personal experience is anything to go by, I have moved transactions online where I find it easier to do so, however I will always use the phone for more complicated transactions or where a conversation is involved.

It's not surprising that investors have been piling money into mobile.  Latest figures show that in the US, in Q3 2013, venture capital investors poured $1.12 billion across 150 deals into U.S. mobile & telecoms companies, marking the largest financing quarter to the mobile sector ever.

As we look to the future, here's 12 2014 predictions  for mobile by app development company Goldengekko.

My 13th predication is that measuring all of the phone activity (on voice and in apps) will become increasingly used and understood by businesses  as they calculate the return on investment they get on their marketing where the response (call to action is a phone call).

In the same way that web analytics is now commonplace and understood by almost all businesses with a web channel, phone analytics will become known and used by all businesses that rely on the voice calls for their inbound leads.

It's very good to talk.